For decades commercial-scale fruit juice extraction, such as the extraction of citrus fruits including oranges and grapefruit, largely has utilized fruit juice extraction devices that have a vertical orientation of interdigitating extractor cups. Examples of such technology are found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,649,730, 2,780,988, and later patents assigned to FMC Corporation. In essence, fruit introduced from a side port falls into a lower, fixed extractor cup, at the bottom of which is an entrance of a filter receiving tube, and an upper, moveable extractor cup lowers over this along a vertical axis, causing most fruit rind (or peel) to be ejected through an upper, centered, annular passageway while forcing juice-laden pulp, and plugs of peel at the top and bottom of the juice-laden pulp, into a lower strainer tube. These plugs are further compressed as they travel down the strainer tube, releasing peel oils. The oils from the rind are known to adversely affect flavor and shelf life. It is noted that these extraction devices also comprise a reciprocating orifice tube within the strainer tube which is reciprocated in a relationship with the upper, moveable extractor cup's movement. During the extraction cycle, the majority of the remaining peel is forced, by virtue of the shapes of the contacting surfaces of the interdigitating extractor cups, through the upper, centered annular passageway of the moveable upper extractor cup so that such peel exits near above this cup.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,309,943, modifications of this vertical juice extraction approach were made to increase production rate. Also, a high speed feeding device for use with this extractor was described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,309,944. These patents identify a general interest in increasing production rates in commercial fruit juice extraction facilities. Also, U.S. Pat. No. 4,700,620, assigned to FMC Corporation, teaches an improvement to the above-referenced FMC extraction devices in which a cam controls movement of an orifice tube within the strainer tube, for the stated purpose of reducing contact of the extracted juice with the freshly cut surfaces of the fruit skin. U.S. Pat. No. 5,070,778, also assigned to FMC Corporation, teaches an approach to reduction of peel oil by introduction of a plurality of apertures in the annular cutter head adjacent the annular passageway through which the fruit rind is ejected during the juicing cycle of these units.
The present inventor previously invented, and received patents for, a fruit juice extraction device that in its depicted embodiments is oriented in a substantially horizontal manner, and that provides opposing peeler cups that are effective to press and shear the fruit peel into slivers during the extraction cycle. The latter is based on the configuration and arrangement of the opposing intermeshable peeler blades of the cups. U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,655,441, 5,720,218, 5,802,964, and 5,655,441 describe such device as exemplified in a small, single-cup-pair device. Also, various improvements have been made in the invention, including those directed to drive mechanisms for multi-cup commercial production extraction units. These are described in the publication of Canadian Patent number CA 2347814, and in U.S. Patent Application publication numbers 2005/0028690 and 2005/0199138. U.S. Patent Application publication number 2006/0201345, a continuation of the above referenced patents issued to Applicant, further claims aspects of the invention.
Embodiments of such exemplified horizontal extraction devices have been demonstrated to achieve a fruit extraction with substantially less peel oil in the juice compared to models of the noted vertically oriented interdigitating extractor cups. Notwithstanding these improvements, a need remains to improve the technology of the opposing peeler cups to provide for improved production rates whilst maintaining or improving the quality of the extracted juice. Such need is directed to an economic interest and value in achieving relatively higher production rates for commercial juice extraction units.